The Yellow Crayon eBook

“I am such a very old friend,” Mr. Sabin
said. “I knew her when she was a child.”

Mr. Brott nodded.

“It is very strange,” he said, “that
you should have come together again in such a country
as America, and in a small town too.”

“Lenox,” Mr. Sabin said, “is a small
place, but a great center. By the bye, is there
not some question of an impending marriage on the
part of the Countess?”

“I have heard—­of nothing of the sort,”
Mr. Brott said, looking up startled. Then, after
a moment’s pause, during which he studied closely
his companion’s imperturbable face, he added
the question which forced its way to his lips.

“Have you?”

Mr. Sabin looked along his cigarette and pinched it
affectionately. It was one of his own, which
he had dexterously substituted for those which his
host had placed at his disposal.

“The Countess is a very charming, a very beautiful,
and a most attractive woman,” he said slowly.
“Her marriage has always seemed to me a matter
of certainty.”

Mr. Brott hesitated, and was lost.

“You are an old friend of hers,” he said.
“You perhaps know more of her recent history
than I do. For a time she seemed to drop out
of my life altogether. Now that she has come
back I am very anxious to persuade her to marry me.”

A single lightning-like flash in Mr. Sabin’s
eyes for a moment disconcerted his host. But,
after all, it was gone with such amazing suddenness
that it left behind it a sense of unreality.
Mr. Brott decided that after all it must have been
fancy.

“I am afraid I cannot go so far as to say that
she does,” he said regretfully. “I
do not know why I find myself talking on this matter
to you. I feel that I should apologise for giving
such a personal turn to the conversation.”

“I beg that you will do nothing of the sort,”
Mr. Sabin protested. “I am, as a matter
of fact, most deeply interested.”

“You encourage me,” Mr. Brott declared,
“to ask you a question—­to me a very
important question.”

“You know,” Mr. Brott said, “of
that portion of her life concerning which I have asked
no questions, but which somehow, whenever I think
of it, fills me with a certain amount of uneasiness.
I refer to the last three years which the Countess
has spent in America.”

Mr. Sabin looked up, and his lips seemed to move,
but he said nothing. Mr. Brott felt perhaps
that he was on difficult ground.

“I recognise the fact,” he continued slowly,
“that you are the friend of the Countess, and
that you and I are nothing more than the merest acquaintances.
I ask my question therefore with some diffidence.
Can you tell me from your recent, more intimate knowledge
of the Countess and her affairs, whether there exists
any reason outside her own inclinations why she should
not accept my proposals of marriage?”